We take,
for example, the following admirable passage on the progress of
religious indifference; in which we break off somewhat hastily,
premising that the reader will be induced to turn to the Review itself
for the remainder of the article:--
There was a time, since the worship of images, (and happy would it have
been if the religious habits of the country had thenceforth stood
fixed,) when appropriate texts adorned the walls of the dwelling-rooms,
and children received at night a father's blessing;--and "let us worship
God" was said with solemn air, by the head of the household; and
churches were resorted to daily; and "the parson in journey" gave notice
for prayers in the hall of the inn--"for prayers and provender," quoth
he, "hinder no man;" and the cheerful angler, as he sat under the
willow-tree, watching his quill, trolled out a Christian catch. "Here we
may sit and pray, before death stops our breath;" and the merchant (like
the excellent Sutton, of the Charter House) thought how he could make
his merchandize subservient to the good of his fellow-citizens and the
glory of his God, and accordingly endowed some charitable, and learned,
and religious foundation, worthy of the munificence of a crowned head;
and the grave historian (Lord Clarendon himself does so) chose a text in
his Bible as a motto for his chapter on politics; and religion, in
short, reached unto every place, and, like Elisha stretched on the dead
child, (to use one of Jeremy Taylor's characteristic illustrations),
gave life and animation to every part of the body politic.
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